The invention provides a method for controlling braking of a vehicle (1) driving along a downhill portion of a road, the vehicle comprising a propulsion arrangement (2, 3), for the propulsion of the vehicle, the method comprising dividing the road portion into a plurality of sections (RS0-RS2), the sections comprising a first section (RS1), and a second section (RS2) following, in the direction of travel of the vehicle, immediately upon the first section (RS1), determining, for the road portion, a road portion control strategy, with a condition that braking on the road portion is done at least partly by means of the propulsion arrangement (2, 3), wherein determining the road portion control strategy comprises determining a speed (SD21), on the second section (RS2), with an aim to minimize the time travelled on the second section, and/or, where the propulsion arrangement comprises an internal combustion engine (2), and a gearbox (3), determining a gear selection (GS2) on the second section (RS2), with an aim to minimize the time travelled on in the second section, and wherein determining the road portion control strategy comprises determining, for the first section (RS1), a first section control strategy, with an aim to minimize the time travelled on the first section, and with an aim to provide a vehicle speed at the end of the first section (RS1) which is the same as said determined speed (SD21) on the second section (RS2), and/or to provide a gear selection at the end of the first section which is the same as said determined gear selection (GS2) on the second section (RS2), the method further comprising controlling the vehicle (1) according to the determined road portion control strategy.

Park control systems and methods operate such that, in response to a request to engage or disengage a park pawl of a vehicle park pawl system, a controller commands a hydraulic brake system to maintain a hydraulic brake pressure therein generated in response to depression of a brake pedal by a driver of the vehicle, when vehicle movement is detected after maintaining the hydraulic brake pressure, commands a vacuum-independent electric brake booster to generate and provide additional hydraulic brake pressure to the hydraulic brake system, commands the park pawl system to engage or disengage the park pawl to/from a transmission output shaft, and after the park pawl is engaged or disengaged to/from the transmission output shaft, commands the hydraulic brake system to release its hydraulic pressure at a defined rate.

Systems and methods are provided for controlling a transmission. An engine stop-start event may be allowed or denied based on one or more characteristics of the vehicle including the transmission.

A vehicle transmission can perform predictive shifting. Road grade and vehicle path data can be employed to identify a future change in road grade such as a hill. A change in speed relative to a vehicle cruise speed can be estimated or predicted in view of the change in road grade and a current gear. If the change of speed is determined to be outside a performance bound, shift recommendation can be determined to maintain vehicle cruise speed within the performance bound. A controller can alter default gear selection of the transmission in response to receipt of the shift recommendation.

A method for operating a motor vehicle with a prime mover (1), a drive output (2), and a parking lock (4) is provided. The parking lock (4), in an engaged condition, blocks a shaft (3) coupled to the drive output (2) and, in a disengaged condition, releases the shaft (3). In order to disengage the parking lock (4), at least one coupling mass (6) is coupled to the shaft (3), which is coupled to the drive output (2), while increasing the moment of inertia effective at the shaft (3).

A motor vehicle has an electronically controllable parking lock and an electronically controllable parking brake, which can be controlled individually or in combination. A device having an electronic control unit and a central operating element associated with the parking lock and the parking brake is provided. When the motor vehicle is at a standstill and the central operating element is actuated, the parking lock and the parking brake can be controlled in a specific type of parking-lock and/or parking-brake activation. In a first specific type, during a first actuation of the central operating element, at least the parking brake is automatically activated first. If the central operating element is then re-actuated within a predefined time window, or if the central operating element remains actuated for a predefined minimum time period, the driver is offered at least one possibility of manually selecting a specific type of parking-lock and/or parking-brake activation.

An apparatus for shift control in a vehicle is provided. The apparatus includes storage configured to store speed profiles corresponding to respective gears of the vehicle for each of a plurality of downhill slopes, and a controller configured to perform the shift control in the vehicle based on the speed profiles, when the vehicle coasts on a downhill road.

In a method of controlling an electronic parking brake system to overcome an existing problem occurring in drive away release (DAR) mode, a control unit monitors whether or not a gear change signal is input in a vehicle stopped state, a P position state, or a parking brake applied state. When the gear change signal is input, an accelerator pedal input value of a driver is compared with a predetermined pedal input set value while a gear position of a transmission is maintained in the P position. When the accelerator pedal input value does not exceed the predetermined pedal input set value, a control operation is performed for automatic releasing of a parking brake. When a set time has passed after start of the control operation for the automatic releasing, a control operation of changing the gear position to the D position or the R position is performed.

A method and device for vehicle speed control when towing a heavy load trailer are disclosed. The method includes determining whether a vehicle is in a trailer towing mode; determining whether the vehicle is in a slope-climbing situation or not using a G sensor based road gradient value when the vehicle is determined to be in the trailer towing mode; calculating a difference between the G sensor based road gradient value and a torque-based road gradient value, and determining whether a towed trailer is a heavy load trailer on the basis of the calculated difference, when it is determined the vehicle is in the slope-climbing situation; and performing shift control using a heavy load trailer dedicated shift map when the towed trailer is determined to be a heavy load trailer.

An apparatus and a method for controlling a transmission of a vehicle may include a determining device configured to determine whether a curved road is present within a predetermined distance in front of the vehicle, based on information on a front road, a calculating device configured to correct, based on information on a gradient of the curved road, a vehicle speed in starting cornering of the vehicle on the curved road, determine an expected lateral acceleration based on the corrected vehicle speed and information on a curvature of the curved road, and determine a pattern correcting coefficient based on the determined expected lateral acceleration, a pattern correcting device configured to correct a gearshifting pattern of the transmission, which is preset, based on the pattern correcting coefficient, and a control device connected to the determining device, the calculating device and the pattern correcting device and configured to control the transmission based on the corrected gearshifting pattern when the vehicle enters the curved road.